


Out of Bounds

by princessofthedeadsheep



Series: A Step in the Wrong Direction [5]
Category: Code Lyoko
Genre: Dysfunctional Family, Family Secrets, Gen, Heavy Angst, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Drug Use, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Loss of Trust, Trust Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-23
Updated: 2015-08-23
Packaged: 2018-04-16 21:03:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4640148
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/princessofthedeadsheep/pseuds/princessofthedeadsheep
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ulrich's been having a rough time of it, which isn't helped when he enters his and Odd's dorm to discover Odd reading his journal.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Out of Bounds

**Author's Note:**

> This is the definitive last of the series. I'm officially done. I'm satisfied. It's been fun, but I think Odd and Ulrich are done being angst ridden, at least in this capacity, for now.

Odd clutched Ulrich’s journal in his hand, poised to open it. Anger was waylaid long enough to allow him to think- his conscience already nagging at him for the breach of privacy- but anger has a way of blinding the conscience. Ulrich had been driving Odd crazy lately, and Odd knew he wasn’t the only one. Ulrich had a way of being moody that sent them all up a wall. Usually though, it ended far sooner than this. It had been two and a half weeks since this had started and Ulrich was still sulking! It was ridiculous. And of course, when Ulrich was in such a mood, he was short tempered, grumpy, and at times downright mean.

But he hadn’t really done anything too bad his conscience argued, and despite himself, Odd knew it to be true. That didn’t mean Ulrich hadn’t been hurting him and the others with both his silence and his anger. Odd was done. He wanted to know the problem, wanted to confront it, and Ulrich wasn’t budging. So Odd opened up Ulrich’s journal and began to read.

CLCLCLCLCLCLCL

Ulrich was not in a good mood. He tried his hardest to reign it in, but at this point the best he could do was keep from being as snappish as he wanted to be, which wasn’t that great. It didn’t help that he really, _really_ wanted to do something he shouldn’t. Maybe several things he shouldn’t. He knew better- of course he did- but that wasn’t helping him now.

Calls from home were getting ...stressful. His father never called (and thank god for that) but his mother called at least once a month, and she’d been calling practically daily since the car accident. It was irony at its finest, Ulrich thought. The two cars had been his father’s and his uncle’s. All the victims of this particular crash were in his family, and he was torn. On one hand, he should feel about as bad for his dad as he did his grandmother who had also been in the crash (he did not). On the other hand, most of his family was full of dicks he hated being around anyway, so why should it matter?

Everyone appeared to be on the road to recovery, so he supposed it didn’t matter, but that didn’t mean it changed how he felt about it. Even worse, he knew his father would use the accident to guilt trip him about his grades because his father was good at that. Of course he’d been doing worse in classes because he couldn’t focus, so that was out of the question. He’d been craving the pain and was angry at himself for his need to hurt himself. He knew he couldn’t, and he’d thought he was past that, but he should have known better. It was exhausting to fight. It was exhausting to fight his own needs and to help fight Odd’s needs, but he managed, barely.

Still, he had the intense desire to just go into his dorm room and sleep, and he was going to do just that. He opened the door to their dorm—

To see Odd reading his journal. Fear came first, quickly followed by fury. “What the hell are you doing?” he swept into the room, slamming the door shut as he moved to take the journal from Odd’s hands. Odd didn’t move, let Ulrich snatch the book from his hands without a fight. His eyes were just as furious as Ulrich’s, just as betrayed.

“Why didn’t you tell us? Why didn’t you tell _me_?” Odd demanded, tears at the edges of his vision. Whether they were tears of fury or sadness, Ulrich couldn’t quite tell, didn’t quite care.

“Don’t turn this around! You invaded my privacy! You read my journal! What the hell Odd?” Ulrich waved the journal at Odd.

“No don’t you turn this around!” Odd surged up, batted the journal out of the way and to the ground, fury clearly displayed now. “You’ve been sulking for weeks and you haven’t been talking to any of us. It didn’t matter what we did, you refused to talk to any of us. I just wanted to know what was wrong, why you’ve been acting so awful these last few weeks, why you wouldn’t talk to any of us, even me and Yumi. Then I read that not only have three people in your family ended up in the hospital, but that you’ve also... that you- why didn’t you tell me?” his voice breaks, and Odd looks like he might actually cry now.

Ulrich is feeling exposed and angry and he isn’t entirely sure what to do. He runs his hands through his hair and turns away from Odd.

“It wasn’t any of your business. I’ve stopped.”

“Like what I was doing was any of yours?”

"You were hurting yourself," Ulrich whirls around and fury returns. "I was better, okay? I was doing so much better! Seeing you doing it, knowing that one day I might find you-" Ulrich cuts himself off. "It was like looking into some sort of twisted mirror. You think you were bad? You were only at the tip of the iceberg Odd. I live in a goddamn family of shitty coping mechanisms! I've seen the bad ends to every single one." It grates against his senses to tell, but it isn't even that much to say. It isn't even the details that matter.

"I've got a family of alcoholics, and drug addicts, people who constantly run away from their problems and pretend everything is fine. You think you know how bad you had it? I've been looking into my future since I was old enough to realize what the fuck was going on in my twisted, fucked up family. And I know, I've seen what happens to people like us. I had a cousin who locked herself in her bathroom, slit her wrists and never came out again. Maybe you'd get there, maybe you wouldn't, but I was never willing to let you figure it out."

"Ulrich, you've never told me that." Odd's voice is more than a little bit stunned, but Ulrich's face is impassive.

"And why would I? What good would it do? You're still not entirely okay. I'm not either, really, and it doesn't help if I push myself to think about those things. It doesn't matter. Talking about it doesn't change anything."

"I could have helped you."

"You think helping you never helped me? It did."

"But I wasn't there for you," Odd persists.

"I didn't need or want you to be there for me," he says simply.

"Oh, and I wanted you to be there for me?" Odd quirks his eyebrow at Ulrich, who glares back. "As for need, how do you know? How do you know you didn't need my help?"

"I did fine on my own." Ulrich replied.

“Yeah, you did. Until this accident thing happened. You telling me it wouldn’t have been easier, that you wouldn’t have been less of an asshole if you’d bothered to talk to any of us? So that one of us could have told you that you don’t have to feel bad about things just because they happened to people who have a blood relation to you? That your family, blood or no, doesn’t make your future definite? Are you telling me, you never needed or wanted to hear some of the things you said to me?” Odd’s voice is steady, his eyes now clear. There’s understanding there, something that Ulrich doesn’t really like to see.

Because Odd isn’t wrong. There were times when he wanted the same understanding he gave to Odd, times when he did want that reassurance. These are overshadowed by the ingrained need to keep secrets, to keep family matters in the family, to shove down the shameful secrets that would tarnish the Stern reputation.

“Maybe,” he admitted before he brushed it off. “I’m still angry at you,” Ulrich glares at Odd, who only nods.

“Don’t think I’m not still angry with you either. And you need to tell the others something, apologize. None of us deserved to be treated so crappily because you were upset, Ulrich.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Ulrich rubbed a hand against the back of his neck. “I’ve been trying to tone it down.”

“We’ve noticed. We still deserve an apology, and maybe some groveling.” Odd said with a grin. “We can have an actual argument a little later tonight. Right now, you’re going to apologize, and we’re going to hang with our friends. We’ll both feel better for it.”

“I wish you weren’t right.” Ulrich sighed. “Just promise me you will never, ever, ever read my journal again.”

“I’ll promise not to if you promise to talk to one of us, any one of us, when something’s bothering you this much.” Odd said, waving the journal that Ulrich had dropped in front of his face. Ulrich snatched it from him.

“Fine. I promise. Have I told you how annoying you are lately?”

“That’s not good groveling!” Odd responded cheerfully as he headed to the door. Ulrich sighed, put his journal back, then followed Odd out the door to talk to their friends.


End file.
